No one saw them last night. But they saw everything. Up in the rafters of the AT&T Center, whirring nonstop, were six cameras, three per half-court. They took pictures of the Suns and Spurs. They took a lot of them. SportVU is an optical tracking system that creates a digital footprint of a game. Originally […]
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It’s never a goal for Gregg Popovich or his players, but now that Popovich has been officially installed as coach for the Western Conference All-Star team, the veteran of 16-plus seasons on the Spurs’ bench admits he looks forward to a weekend with some of basketball’s best players. Popovich earned his spot because the Spurs […]
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By Jeff McDonald NEW ORLEANS — It has been 148 days since the Spurs trudged off the court in Oklahoma City, ego-bruised and beaten. A 20-game winning streak had given way to a four-game losing streak in the Western Conference finals, a chance to return to the NBA Finals for the first time since 2007 […]
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NEW ORLEANS — Manu Ginobili sat out then, as he will tonight. Tony Parker stood up. Parker, nursing a sore back, chose to stand near the bench when he wasn’t in the game because sitting was too uncomfortable. Gregg Popovich, meanwhile, couldn’t find any position that was comfortable. This was a season ago, in New […]
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It just doesn’t seem possible that one team can continue to hit the jackpot as often as the Los Angeles Lakers. From Wilt Chamberlain to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Shaquille O’Neal to Pau Gasol, there might not be a franchise in North American pro sports that has had more success prying prime assets from their competitors. […]
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The Oklahoma City Thunder’s victory over the Spurs in the Western Conference finals represents a breakthrough for the up-and-coming club. Either the Spurs, Lakers or Mavericks had represented the West in the NBA Finals every season since 1998-99, and the Thunder beat all three to break that string. Here’s a closer look: Year — Team […]
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By Jeff McDonald The team plane took off in the darkness of early morning, not long after a Game 6 ouster to a team that made the Spurs, as we know them, seem a relic of the past. They arrived back in San Antonio amid questions about the future and whether the franchise’s window for […]
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By Jeff McDonald For a brief moment there, the Spurs were the darlings of the professional basketball world, a breathtaking ball of butcher knives that had normally sober, measured pundits wondering if they might sweep their way to a fifth NBA title. Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili were the two best players in the Western […]
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By Roy Bragg OKLAHOMA CITY — It’s easy to find James Goldstein among 18,000 fans in any NBA arena. First, look at the front row. Then, look for the guy wearing an ensemble such as the one he was wearing here Saturday night — brown leather boots, black leather pants, brown leather jacket, a black […]
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